Numbers in English: cardinal and ordinal numbers
Learn numbers in English from 0 to a billion, cardinal and ordinal numbers, and how to say dates, years, phone numbers and prices.
In this lesson
Numbers in English come in two types. Cardinal numbers, such as one, two and three, tell you how many. Ordinal numbers, such as first, second and third, tell you the order or position. This lesson teaches numbers from 0 to a billion, ordinal numbers, and how to say dates, years, phone numbers and prices.
Key point
Use cardinal numbers to count (three books) and ordinal numbers to show order (the third book). After a number, hundred, thousand and million never take -s: two hundred people.
How do you count from 0 to 20 in English?
Learn the numbers from 0 to 12 by heart, because each one is a different word. From 13 to 19, add -teen: thirteen, fourteen, fifteen. Be careful with the spelling of thirteen, fifteen and eighteen.
| Word | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| zero | The number 0. | Add a zero to 10 and you get 100. |
| one | The number 1. | I have one brother. |
| two | The number 2. | We have two cats. |
| three | The number 3. | She drinks three cups of tea a day. |
| four | The number 4. | A car has four wheels. |
| five | The number 5. | School starts in five minutes. |
| six | The number 6. | There are six eggs in the box. |
| seven | The number 7. | There are seven days in a week. |
| eight | The number 8. | A spider has eight legs. |
| nine | The number 9. | My little brother is nine years old. |
| ten | The number 10. | I have ten fingers. |
| eleven | The number 11. | A cricket team has eleven players. |
| twelve | The number 12. | There are twelve months in a year. |
| thirteen | The number 13. | My sister is thirteen. |
| fourteen | The number 14. | The bus leaves in fourteen minutes. |
| fifteen | The number 15. | Fifteen students passed the test. |
| sixteen | The number 16. | He started work at sixteen. |
| seventeen | The number 17. | There are seventeen chairs in the room. |
| eighteen | The number 18. | You can vote when you are eighteen. |
| nineteen | The number 19. | She was nineteen when she moved to Colombo. |
| twenty | The number 20. | I paid twenty dollars for this book. |
How do you say numbers from 21 to 100?
The tens from 20 to 90 end in -ty. For the numbers in between, say the ten and then the single number, with a hyphen in writing: twenty-one, thirty-five, ninety-nine. 100 is a hundred or one hundred.
| Word | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| thirty | The number 30. | April has thirty days. |
| forty | The number 40. | My father is forty years old. |
| fifty | The number 50. | There are fifty students in the hall. |
| sixty | The number 60. | There are sixty minutes in an hour. |
| seventy | The number 70. | My grandmother is seventy. |
| eighty | The number 80. | The old bridge is eighty years old. |
| ninety | The number 90. | A football match lasts ninety minutes. |
Tip
To hear the difference between thirteen and thirty, listen for the stress. Numbers from 13 to 19 are stressed at the end: thirteen. Tens are stressed at the start: thirty.
Common mistake
My father is fourty years old. → My father is forty years old.
How do you say big numbers in English?
Put hundred, thousand, million and billion after a number, with no -s: two hundred, five thousand, three million. In British English, say and before the last part: three hundred and forty-five. In writing, put a comma every three digits from the right: 1,000, 25,000, 1,000,000.
| Word | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| hundred | The number 100. Say a hundred or one hundred. | Two hundred people came to the wedding. |
| thousand | The number 1,000. | The phone costs forty-five thousand rupees. |
| million | The number 1,000,000. | Sri Lanka has about 22 million people. |
| billion | The number 1,000,000,000. | There are about eight billion people in the world. |
Examples
- 101: a hundred and one, or one hundred and one
- 345: three hundred and forty-five
- 1,250: one thousand two hundred and fifty
- 10,000: ten thousand
- 100,000: a hundred thousand
- 2,500,000: two million five hundred thousand
Common mistake
Two hundreds people came to the meeting. → Two hundred people came to the meeting.
Use hundreds of, thousands of and millions of, with -s and no number in front, for a large amount that is not exact: Thousands of people visit Sigiriya every year.
Note
In Sri Lanka and India you may hear lakh (100,000) and crore (10,000,000). Many international speakers do not know these words, so in international English say a hundred thousand and ten million.
Other useful number words
| Word | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| half | One of two equal parts (1/2). | Half of the class is absent today. |
| quarter | One of four equal parts (1/4). | A quarter of an hour is fifteen minutes. |
| dozen | A group of twelve. | I bought a dozen eggs. |
What are ordinal numbers?
Ordinal numbers show order or position: first, second, third. We use them for dates, floors of a building, places in a race and birthdays. Most ordinal numbers add -th: fourth, sixth, tenth. Learn the irregular ones: first, second, third, fifth, eighth, ninth and twelfth. For the tens, change -y to -ieth: twentieth, thirtieth. In bigger numbers, only the last part changes: twenty-first, forty-second.
| Word | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| first | Number 1 in order. Short form: 1st. | January is the first month of the year. |
| second | Number 2 in order. Short form: 2nd. | She came second in the race. |
| third | Number 3 in order. Short form: 3rd. | Our classroom is on the third floor. |
| fourth | Number 4 in order. Short form: 4th. | This is my fourth visit to Kandy. |
| fifth | Number 5 in order. Short form: 5th. | My birthday is on the fifth of June. |
| sixth | Number 6 in order. Short form: 6th. | The sixth question was the hardest. |
| seventh | Number 7 in order. Short form: 7th. | We live in the seventh house on the left. |
| eighth | Number 8 in order. Short form: 8th. | August is the eighth month of the year. |
| ninth | Number 9 in order. Short form: 9th. | This is the ninth time he has called me today. |
| tenth | Number 10 in order. Short form: 10th. | October is the tenth month of the year. |
| eleventh | Number 11 in order. Short form: 11th. | Our office is on the eleventh floor. |
| twelfth | Number 12 in order. Short form: 12th. | December is the twelfth month of the year. |
| thirteenth | Number 13 in order. Short form: 13th. | Her birthday is on the thirteenth of May. |
| twentieth | Number 20 in order. Short form: 20th. | The festival starts on the twentieth of May. |
| twenty-first | Number 21 in order. Short form: 21st. | We live in the twenty-first century. |
| thirtieth | Number 30 in order. Short form: 30th. | My parents celebrated their thirtieth wedding anniversary. |
| hundredth | Number 100 in order. Short form: 100th. | The school celebrated its hundredth anniversary. |
Tip
The short form uses the last two letters of the word: first (1st), second (2nd), third (3rd), fourth (4th). So we write 21st, 22nd and 23rd, but 11th, 12th and 13th.
How do you say dates in English?
In British English, write the day first, then the month: 5 June 2026 or 5th June 2026. Say the day as an ordinal number with the and of: the fifth of June, or June the fifth. In American English, people write June 5, 2026 and say June fifth.
Examples
- My birthday is on the twelfth of March.
- The exam is on the first of July.
- Sri Lanka celebrates Independence Day on the fourth of February.
- Christmas Day is on the twenty-fifth of December.
- I was born on 3 August 2008. (the third of August, two thousand and eight)
Note
Dates written only in numbers can be confusing. In British English, 04/07/2026 means 4 July 2026. In American English, the month comes first, so 04/07/2026 means 7 April 2026. Write the month as a word when the reader might be from another country.
How do you say years in English?
Say years before 2000 in two pairs: 1998 is nineteen ninety-eight. For 2000 to 2009, say two thousand: two thousand and eight. From 2010, both ways are common: twenty twenty-six or two thousand and twenty-six. Use in with years: in 2026.
| Written | Say | Example |
|---|---|---|
| 1998 | nineteen ninety-eight | I was born in 1998. |
| 1900 | nineteen hundred | The house was built in 1900. |
| 2000 | two thousand | The Olympic Games were in Sydney in 2000. |
| 2008 | two thousand and eight | She started school in 2008. |
| 2015 | twenty fifteen, or two thousand and fifteen | We moved to Galle in 2015. |
| 2026 | twenty twenty-six, or two thousand and twenty-six | The new library opens in 2026. |
| 1990s | the nineteen nineties, or the nineties | My parents met in the 1990s. |
How do you say phone numbers in English?
Say phone numbers one digit at a time, with a short pause between groups. Most people say oh for 0, and double when the same digit comes twice.
| Word | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| oh | A common way to say 0 in phone numbers and some years. | My number starts with oh seven seven. |
| double | Two of the same digit together, as in 55 (double five). | The number ends in double three. |
| triple | Three of the same digit together, as in 777 (triple seven). | Our office number ends in triple four. |
Examples
- 011 234 5678: oh one one, two three four, five six seven eight
- 071 234 5566: oh seven one, two three four, double five double six
- What’s your phone number? It’s oh seven seven, four five six, double one two three.
How do you say prices in rupees and dollars?
Say the number first, then the money word. Use the plural after any number bigger than one: one rupee, fifty rupees, one dollar, ten dollars. The short form Rs or the symbol $ comes before the number in writing, but you say the money word after it.
| Written | Say |
|---|---|
| Rs 50 | fifty rupees |
| Rs 250 | two hundred and fifty rupees |
| Rs 1,500 | one thousand five hundred rupees, or fifteen hundred rupees |
| Rs 25,000 | twenty-five thousand rupees |
| $1 | one dollar, or a dollar |
| $4.99 | four dollars ninety-nine, or four ninety-nine |
| $0.50 | fifty cents |
| $1,200 | one thousand two hundred dollars, or twelve hundred dollars |
| Word | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| rupee | The money of Sri Lanka, India and some other countries. Short form: Rs. | This notebook costs two hundred and fifty rupees. |
| dollar | The money of the USA, Australia and some other countries. Symbol: $. | The book costs twelve dollars. |
| cent | A small unit of money: 100 cents make one rupee or one dollar. | The price is four dollars and ninety-nine cents. |
| price | The amount of money you pay for something. | What is the price of this shirt? |
| cost | To have a price. The past form is also cost. | How much does this bag cost? |
Examples
- How much is this? It’s two hundred rupees.
- These shoes cost three thousand five hundred rupees.
- Do you have change for a thousand-rupee note?
- The ticket costs fifteen dollars.
Common mistake
I only have a five-dollars note. → I only have a five-dollar note.
When a number and a money word come before a noun, the money word has no -s: a five-dollar note, a thousand-rupee note.
How can you practise numbers every day?
Tip
Read numbers aloud wherever you see them: bus numbers, prices in shops, page numbers and the date on your phone. Say today’s date every morning, for example Today is the sixth of November.
Numbers appear in many other lessons. Use them with days, months and seasons in English to talk about dates, and with prepositions of time: in, on and at (on 5 June, in 2026). To ask about amounts, learn How many and How much in our lesson on Wh- questions and question words. Combine numbers with colours in English to describe things (two blue bags), and review every number word in the English Word Bank.
For more detail, read the Cambridge Dictionary grammar guide to numbers and the Cambridge Dictionary guide to writing and saying dates.
Now test yourself with this practice quiz.
Summary
- Cardinal numbers count (one, two, three); ordinal numbers show order (first, second, third).
- Numbers from 21 to 99 have a hyphen: twenty-one, ninety-nine.
- Hundred, thousand and million have no -s after a number, and British English adds and: three hundred and five.
- Say dates with ordinal numbers: the fifth of June.
- Say phone numbers digit by digit, and put the money word after the number: fifty rupees.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between cardinal and ordinal numbers?
Cardinal numbers tell you how many: one, two, three. Ordinal numbers tell you the order or position: first, second, third.
Do you say and in numbers like 120?
In British English, yes: one hundred and twenty. In American English, people often leave out and: one hundred twenty.
How do you say 0 in English?
It depends on the situation. Say zero in maths and for temperatures, oh in phone numbers and some years, and nil for football scores in British English.
How do you write the date in British English?
Write the day, then the month, then the year: 5 June 2026. Say the fifth of June, twenty twenty-six, or June the fifth.
Is it fourty or forty?
The correct spelling is forty, with no u, even though four has a u. Fourteen and fourth keep the u.
Practise this lesson
12 questions
